Cisco DNA Advisor
Learn more about the Cisco Digital Network Readiness Model.
Is your network ready for digital transformation?
Digital disruption is happening all around us. Some of the questions business and IT leaders are asking themselves include:
- “How ready is my network to handle digitization?”
- “Can our network drive faster innovation and support changing business models and processes?”
- “Will it deal with the scale, complexity, and risks introduced by all the additional devices and applications being propelled by mobility, cloud, and Internet of Things?”
- “Can we make it more efficient to deploy and maintain?”
The answers will depend on having the right network. Determining the path to that network can be daunting without the right plan.
Resources
What’s Fueling the Need for Change?
Network Readiness Model eBook
Get your copy of the complete Digital Network Readiness Model in PDF format.
Download eBook
Cisco Digital Network Architecture
Learn more about the Cisco Digital Network Architecture (DNA).
Digital Network Principles
Five basic principles that contribute to delivering a network ready for the digital age.
Virtualize Everything
Decoupling hardware from software gives organizations the freedom to run any network service anywhere, whatever the underlying platform: physical or virtual, on-premises or in the cloud.
Design for Automation
Automation makes network management easier and simpler. By providing a platform for consistent service alignment and policy enforcement, automation accelerates application and service rollout while reducing risk.
Pervasive Analytics
Network-enabled analytics provide insights that help IT and the business make better, faster decisions. Analytics use the power of the network to create value from data gleaned from Internet of Things (IoT) initiatives and helps quickly identify anomalies and contain threats.
Service Management Delivered From the Cloud
A cloud-enabled network uses an ecosystem of cloud-based network, management and automation services for speed, scale and flexibility. Unify policy and orchestration across the network, enabling both the agility of cloud solutions and the control of on-premises solutions.
Open, Extensible and Programmable at Every Layer
Open interfaces let business applications and IT systems communicate service and policy requirements directly to the network. Programmable devices make controller-based automation and software-defined networking easier and more sustainable.
Model Categories
Measure advancments through five primary categories.
Network Architecture Strategy
The architecture evolves from a totally hardware and device centric model, to a partially automated, controller-based architecture, and finally arriving at a fully software-delivered, self-optimizing model that’s fully cloud-enabled.
Automation
Automation is less likely in the beginning stages. But as the network evolves, we can use tools to simplify and centralize network management. This evolves to the introduction of controller-based networks, enabling automation of specific domains like the WAN, or data center or QoS; to a stage where software-defined, controller-based capabilities are introduced across all devices and services. Agility and efficiency benefits of Automation are experienced at every stage, but fully materialize in the final stage. In this environment, we use analytics data to identify current or predicted gaps. And based on that insight, the automation engine can prescribe the network adjustments needed to deliver on the vision of a self-driving network.
Security
At first, we simply expect patchy policy enforcement at high-risk places - like the traditional perimeter – and some fragmented threat detection capabilities. As we move through the next stages, centralized access policy and control, real-time visibility, and threat and anomaly detection become network-wide and much more prevalent. This allows you to respond much faster to attacks as they happen anywhere across the network. Finally, in the latter stages, we start seeing automated and even predictive self-protecting capabilities so the network can do battle on your behalf. This progression is critical for your business to take on “digital transformation” with confidence.
Service Assurance
In the beginning we can count on basic QoS functionality at critical WAN choke points. That evolves by increasing end-to-end QoS for a few choice apps like voice; to a controller-based environment where QoS policies are applied effortlessly for all applications, network-wide; and culminating with better validated policies and self-optimized network configurations. Essentially, a flexible network that can quickly respond to new applications, services, and business requirements.
Analytics
Typically, in the beginning, we make very limited use of the data available through the network, likely only device-related monitoring and events. Charting through the evolution, network-wide visibility begins to increase, evolving to accurate location-based analytics that recognize trends among users and devices. We also begin to gain the real benefits of global network visibility, which lends itself to trending and forecasting and more efficient and effective support. In the final stages of evolution, we can embrace an increased use of predictive analytics to identify trends and act upon them before they impact the organization. The goal? To deliver highly valuable network-enabled insights that can be automatically acted upon for the business and IT to gain a competitive advantage.
Technology Attributes
Advance cloud, mobility and IoT at each stage of the readiness journey
Cloud-enabled
Digitization requires more scalability, agility, and openness, which demands new ways to run the network. Shifting to the cloud (private, public, or hybrid) to deliver network services such as management, security and analytics makes a network more agile as well as more scalable and open to third-party innovations.
Mobility-enabled
Mobile devices and applications enable new ways of working. Therefore, a digital-ready network must be built for mobility and enable an enhanced experience from anywhere on any device. And of course, a digital-ready network needs to protect the business from the higher risk that comes with opening up network access.
IoT-enabled
From remote patient monitoring to predictive maintenance to asset tracking, IoT makes enhanced and totally new business models possible. To support IoT-connected devices, applications, and processes, the network needs new capabilities that provide the service and security they demand.
Business-Network Alignment
Achieving improved business-to-network alignment at each stage
Business Services
The purpose of a digital-ready network is to enable the digital business and the broad set of associated business functions and applications. Applications enabling customer experience, workforce experience, and business operations require specific levels of service assurance, security, compliance and operational efficiency from the network.
Service Alignment
The alignment between what the applications and the business require from the network and the services that the network can deliver improves through each stage of the readiness model. Service alignment is evolving from a best-effort manual alignment to very tight closed-loop integration between business requirements (for example IT operations, application service levels, and security policy and compliance requirements) and the underlying network.
Management
The approach to managing network devices and network services has a direct impact on business-to-network alignment. The evolution from device-centric management to open and extensible controller-based, policy-driven management and automation allows the network to respond instantaneously to business intent and requirements.
Infrastructure
The infrastructure across the access, campus, wide-area and data center networks is increasingly programmable, virtualized and software-defined through each stage of the readiness model. This provides a platform for improved automation, analytics, security and service assurance through each stage of the readiness model.
Business Service Requirements
Communicating service assurance, policy and compliance and operations requirements
Whether an organization is creating a new service or process, upgrading its security policy, facing a new regulation, or entering the world of IoT, it needs to ensure that the network can support these initiatives. Traditionally, this assurance was achieved in a hit-or-miss way by IT attempting to manually translate the requirements into network configurations.
This approach inevitably slows down and can even derail these initiatives because so much intent and time can be lost in translation. To avoid this, a digital-ready network can understand the policies and needs of the business and make the necessary changes whenever needed.
Application Service Levels
By communicating application service level requirements to the network, the needs of users and processes can be met consistently. Digital organizations need a network that can continuously deliver service levels aligned with expressed and implied business intent. All applications and services must be assured of service across all users, devices, and locations.
Policy and Compliance
Policy applies to the organization’s security decisions about network user roles and responsibilities. Policies must cover all network systems and data as well as governmental and trade organization regulations. Traditionally, policies have been applied as fragmented, manual network security mechanisms. In a more connected — and riskier — mobile world, digital organizations need real-time, dynamic, and automated ways to apply policies and comply with regulations across the network.
IT Operations
For IT to keep up with the rate of change and the new demands of the digital network, IT operations must be more agile and responsive. Time-consuming manual and error-prone processes must be replaced with simpler automated ones. IT needs to create operating models and technology capabilities, such as self-service catalogs, that integrate business requirements and network services much more extensively.